Upcoming Projects

As a habit, I’ve come to the point where I don’t really like to talk about something unless it’s actually usable. New projects, new software, new games, new apps…you name it…if it’s not out there and usable (at least in beta form), I’m hesitant to talk about it at all.

But to break this “rule” (because that’s what rules are really for), I want to let you know what is going on here with certain sections of zog.ninja.

There are a few different sections (accessible at the top of the page) that say “COMING SOON” when you click on them, and indeed they really are coming soon, so let me describe what these are (concentrating particularly on two of them)…

The World Wild Web: Easily accessible via the URL “rewild.xyz“, this is a project I’m starting where I will list websites that have made it a point to create cohesive online “ecosystems” within themselves, with no reliance on social media (ie: Facebook, Twitter, etc.) for the users to access content. I will also discuss there the “philosophy” of the necessity of this, as too many projects (liberty-oriented or not) are depending more and more on third-party services like social media to achieve their goals and to spread news and content. I think this is a recipe for disaster. Companies like Google are notorious for removing entire feature sets and capabilities with practically no warning, and if your online ventures and engagement were reliant upon those third-party services, you’d be completely out of luck and could have a total loss of your business or audience. Also, these third-parties generally have no real concern for the human liberties of your clientele or audience, and are major supporters of the “Surveillance State” and “Surveillance Society” that we live in, so moving away from those third-parties is essential to have actual freedom in your life, in my opinion. I also fancy the idea of reintroducing the one-time popular idea of “webrings“, which would also get people away from the use of privacy-encroaching search engines. It’s what I call “rewilding the Web”, and I consider it an important cause until the day comes when we have actual P2P networks (ie: MaidSafe, ZeroNet, Maelstrom, etc.) up and running in full stride.

The Sovryn Hedony: Now, just because I want to get away from social media in general, doesn’t necessarily mean that I consider all social media some kind of grand evil. The companies that we largely have to deal with now certainly are in many ways, but the real problem with them is that it is antithetical to enriching human communication, in my opinion. As a byproduct of “The World Wild Web”, I am creating my own hybrid social media/forum site that will be available by going to the URL “hedony.xyz“. Is this a Facebook-killer? Not necessarily. But it will be a place where you can come and be able to enter a realm of ideas, human advancement, and hopefully a lot of understanding. I have no intention of it scaling very large, in fact it would go against my own aims. My aims are not to “connect the world to each other”, I just want to have an online basecamp where people of like-mindedness can come and converse (and due to the Dunbar Number, I don’t expect that to ever grow very large). While you’ll certainly be able to be anonymous on it, please understand that this is in no way some kind of encrypted platform (other than SSL). I’m still debating on whether or not I’m going to “gate” it, and there will be private messaging options, but please don’t rely on this for any kind of “NSA-proofing”. Those sorts of things require teams, and I am largely a one-man show here with everything done and available at zog.ninja. But if anarchists or voluntarists–even if they’re not tech-savvy or minded–want a place to hangout, the Sovryn Hedony will be here for you.

So those are a couple of projects that are taking up my Summer to develop. Of course, more games (including HYPERCRONIUS II which will be bigger, longer, sexier, and has more gameplay!), daily content on the site, the Sovryn Tech podcast, and some other surprises are all being worked on at the same time, so your patience is appreciated. Keep checking the ZOG Blog for updates!